The earth needs silence in order for life to survive on it.
Scientists at Queen's University Belfast ranked anthropogenic noise - the one that mankind creates - among the main environmental pollutants and warned that it poses a real threat to life on Earth. The so-called meta-analysis pushed environmentalists to such gloomy forecasts - the study of the results of more than 100 studies on the impact of noise on wildlife.
Hedgehogs are looking for quiet breeding grounds, but they are hard to find.
The results of the meta-analysis, cited by ScienceAlert, are published in the Royal Society's Biology Letters. They testify that human-made technology is very loud. Unacceptably loud. The sounds made by cars, trains, airplanes, ships, factories, drilling rigs and other units - large and small - poison the lives of most animals. Noise from different sources merges into a cacophony, shaking the ears at a frequency of about 4 kHz - close to what some animals use for communication and others for navigation. Use it quietly. From loud sounds, the hormonal background of representatives of the fauna changes, and their behavior becomes different. Noise also affects marine life, including fish, which are becoming more vulnerable. In their midst, sonars and wind farms are the most noisy.
Earlier than others, insects began to suffer from anthropogenic - noise - pollution of the environment, the number of which has sharply decreased recently. In 100 years, they may disappear altogether, entomologists frighten. Animals that feed on them - reptiles, amphibians, birds - will be drawn to the next world after insects. Plants will die - no one will pollinate them. Without plants, herbivores will starve to death, herbivores - predators. So everyone will disappear after the insects - including people, since they will also have nothing to eat.
The environment needs protection from noise, conclude Hansjoerg Kunc and Rouven Schmidt, authors of the meta-analysis. And they propose to the world community to take appropriate coordinated measures, such as those related to greenhouse gas emissions. Or anthropogenic noise will subside by itself as its organizers die out.
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Noise spoils our figures
Of course, noise also affects people. Not only annoying and keeping you awake. But it also depresses the central nervous system, provokes cardiovascular diseases, disrupts metabolism, and changes - like in animals - the hormonal background.
Only this is not all the harm. As Swedish and Norwegian researchers have found: the higher the noise level, the greater the risk of so-called abdominal obesity - an increase in the waist.
Specialists from the Institute of Environmental Medicine, Karolinska Institutet, Norwegian Institute of Public Health (Oslo, Norway) have been monitoring about 5 thousand Swedes for several years. The data on their physical condition were compared with the levels of the surrounding anthropogenic noise - industrial noise, from cars, railways, and flying aircraft. And they revealed a characteristic feature in people living in areas prone to noise pollution - above 45 decibels.
Don't expect a thin waist if your ears get tired.
Those who are constantly pressed by unfavorable sounds, as a rule, do not gain weight. On the contrary, many are losing weight. As evidenced by the body mass indices. But the figures of people deteriorate: stomachs grow, thighs get fat. For every additional 5 decibels, your waist increases by an average of 0.2 centimeters. And the volume of the hips - by 0.16 centimeters. Men are more susceptible to an increase in the waist, and women are more susceptible to hips.
The cause of the phenomenon has not been established. But scientists are sure that it exists. As reported in the specialized scientific journal Occupational & Environmental Medicine
By the way, the modern world really, as they say, hits the ears: the noise level in a not-so-crowded office is 60 decibels, on the street - 80, in factories 90 and above. That is, there are plenty of sources of extra centimeters at the waist and hips.
VLADIMIR LAGOVSKY